Facing West

by Lucy Lennox

  I led Griff and Nico out to the bunkhouse, laughing at the wild drunken shouts of my sisters, Winnie and Hallie. The twins were complete opposites in every way, but when they got drunk together, they turned into the bosom buddies they’d been when we were little.

  “I love you, Winnipeg!” Hallie shouted into the night.

  “I love you too, Halifax!” Winnie giggled, bumping Hallie’s shoulder and almost sending them both into the scraggly half-dead rosebushes next to the bunkhouse door.

  Nico giggled right along with them. I’d noticed at least an hour ago that he was comfortably shit-faced. I wasn’t quite there, but I was heavily buzzed and couldn’t stop imagining Nico naked. Just the thought of it made me suck in a breath.

  “What?” he asked.

  “What, what?”

  “You gasped.”

  “So?”

  Nico giggled again. “So I want to know why.”

  I couldn’t tell him the real reason. “I can’t stop imagining you naked.”

  Well, fuck.

  More giggling. My eyes stayed riveted to the shining rings in his lower lip as we entered the bunkhouse to the big, vaulted common area.

  “Kiss me,” I suggested.

  Nico’s eyes widened, and he went from giggly to angry in a flash. He looked over at Griff, who was looking around the room in open-eyed wonder. “Don’t you fucking dare,” Nico told Griff.

  “What?” Griff and I asked at the same time.

  “Don’t do it, Griffin,” Nico repeated. His forehead was furrowed angrily. I had no idea what he was upset about, but it didn’t really matter. It was impossible to take him seriously when he was that stinking cute.

  “Do what?” Griff asked in confusion.

  “Kiss him!” he shouted.

  All the Wildes who’d been lounging around the common area stopped talking and turned to see what the hell was going on. Nico’s words must have sunk in because within moments, a chant began somewhere, and then all those fuckers were chanting in sync. “Kiss him, kiss him, kiss him!”

  Nico’s eyes widened even more as he realized what he’d started. “No!” He turned to me in horror. “You can’t kiss him.”

  He looked panicked, and I suddenly put two and two together. Nico thought I’d been referring to kissing Griff. He really was drunk.

  I stepped forward and took Nico’s face in my hands, leaning close until our foreheads were pressed together.

  “Nicolas Salerno, there is no one within a thousand-mile radius I want to kiss besides you,” I said in a low voice.

  Nico whimpered and leaned into me, hooking his fingers through the belt loops on my jeans.

  The chants started up again, this time louder. I was pretty sure no one in my family had ever seen me kiss another person before, but I was too far gone to care. I leaned in and kissed him like his mouth had been made for mine.

  And in that moment I was pretty sure it was.

  Not long after we settled into the bed in one of the rooms, Nico climbed on top of me and began seducing me with lazy kisses all over my body. The slow, tender way we touched and teased was something new and raw between us. Maybe it was the alcohol, or maybe it was the relief of knowing Pippa was okay and we could be together without worrying about her for one night. Regardless of the reason, it was a kind of lovemaking I’d never known before.

  Our eyes stayed riveted on each other as we moved together, and even when we came, our eyes never strayed. Something changed between us that night, and I knew we were no longer just hooking up. Even if Nico thought what we were doing was just sex, I knew the truth.

  I was falling in love with him. As his departure hurdled toward us at breakneck speed, it was only a matter of time before my heart was crushed in the wreckage.

  I woke up hard as a rock in an unfamiliar room tangled with a wonderfully familiar body. Nico’s legs were pretzeled with mine, and our fingers were intertwined where I held his hand on my chest. My heart immediately started its stupid flippy-floppy Nico routine, and I almost groaned at the cliché of it all.

  I pulled his hand up to press it to my lips. The warmth of his skin and the smell of him hardened my cock even further. Nico shifted and leaned into me, sliding his head from the pillow onto my shoulder. The move must have woken him up because he made a small noise of complaint and winced.

  “Good morning,” I said, turning to run the fingers of my free hand through his purple mane.

  “No.”

  “Yes. Any morning I wake up next to a hot, naked man is definitely a good morning,” I countered.

  “I’m not naked,” he mumbled without moving.

  “Not yet, but we can change that right this second,” I said, shifting my fingers to the waistband of his underwear.

  He shoved his morning wood against my thigh. “If I thought I could move without my brain or stomach exploding, I’d totally strip down and beg you for it.”

  “What if you just stay still and let me suck you off?”

  Please, oh, please let him agree to my suggestion.

  “Has anyone ever said no to that in the history of ever?” Nico asked. “Let’s be real.”

  I carefully slid out from under him and settled his head on the pillow, pulling his hips around so he was lying flat on his back. A slice of morning sun cut through the gap between the curtains and fell across the side of his face and chest.

  “Be still,” I murmured as I dropped a kiss on the unmarked skin over his heart. His hands came up and held my head lightly, following my movement as I sucked on his nipples and bit marks down his abdomen to his hips.

  Just before I got to the good stuff, Nico bolted upright, accidentally jamming his knee in my stomach.

  “Oh fuck,” I grunted, doubling over.

  “The baby,” he said in a rush. “We have to go check on her.”

  I took a few beats to mentally confirm I hadn’t taken a hit to the balls. Nico must have seen my hesitation because he turned to me with an apologetic look on his face.

  “I’m sorry, West. Are you okay?” He reached out and slid a hand alongside my neck, leaning in to kiss my cheek. “I’m sorry,” he repeated softly into my ear.

  “It’s okay.”

  He looked around, perhaps realizing finally that we were in a strange place.

  “Where are we?”

  I laughed. “The bunkhouse at my grandparents’ ranch. We were all too drunk to drive last night, so we stayed over.”

  “Griff! Oh god. Is Griff here?”

  A stupid curl of jealousy tried to rear its ugly head, but I pushed it down. I knew from talking to him that Griff was loony for his husband back in California.

  “I put him in the room next to ours. Don’t worry. He made friends with everyone here last night, so I’m sure he’s able to fend for himself.”

  We took turns in the tiny bathroom before getting the rest of our clothes back on and wandering out to the common area. Nico knocked on the door I indicated for Griff, but the room was empty.

  We made our way over to the main house and saw most of my extended family in various stages of dress and pajamas, crazy hair sticking up, half-drunk coffee mugs on every surface, and the smell of bacon and blueberry pancakes in the air. God, I loved being at my grandparents’ house with everyone on lazy mornings like this.

  “Don’t any of you slackers have jobs?” I called out as we walked in. It was only seven in the morning, and the fact that almost everyone was up already proved at least several of them had plans to head back to the city soon.

  Griff was face down in a mug of coffee at the huge kitchen table while my aunt Gina babbled on about Napa wineries next to him. He grunted a greeting as we passed him to get to the coffee.

  My cousin Felix was in an overstuffed chair in the family room, giving Pippa a bottle and making silly faces at her. The baby seemed alert and happy, smiling and squinting her eyes at Felix’s antics. I squeezed Nico’s hip and gestured toward Pippa so he would be reassured she was okay.

 
I could sense him relax the minute he laid eyes on her. He wandered over and greeted my shy cousin with a smile, causing Felix to blush and tuck his chin. Doc caught me watching them and shot a wink at me.

  “She’s doing much better this morning,” he said. “Just gave her a second breathing treatment a few hours ago, and that might be all she needs. Fluids and rest ought to do it.”

  “Thanks, Doc. I really appreciate it,” I said, stepping over to him and giving him a big hug. His familiar smell of Old Spice and coffee washed over me like a memory.

  “You gonna explain why you’re on the birth certificate?” he asked in a low voice.

  “I don’t know why. Honestly, I think it’s just in case of emergencies or something. Health benefits maybe. I really don’t know.”

  Doc pulled back and looked at me with his kind, blue eyes. “You going to keep her?”

  The question caught me off guard. “What? No. Of course I’m not going to keep her. What the hell, Doc?”

  He tilted his head and studied me. “Why so quick to answer? It’s not out of the question for you to raise this child, Weston. You were there for Adriana every step of the way. You were her birth coach and her best friend. Everyone knows you’d make a wonderful parent.”

  I was taken aback by his assertion that I should even consider the possibility.

  “Not a more wonderful parent than the Warners. Plus this is Nico’s decision to make.”

  Nico stepped up next to me. “What’s my decision to make?”

  Doc and I locked eyes before I stammered, “Oh, ah, whether or not you’re… ah…”

  “Keeping the bakery open,” Doc cut in smoothly. “Do you know yet what you’re doing with Sugar Britches?”

  “Well, I can’t do much with it until I get the bookkeeping straightened up. I’ve asked Rox to stay on indefinitely and help run it for a while. Once I can get it organized, I’ll reassess. Maybe find someone who wants to buy it. Right now I can’t even sell it with the state it’s in.”

  After getting some coffee down, I made a couple of plates of food and brought one to where Nico had settled next to Griff. They were occupied swapping early-morning grumbles about how so many people could be that cheerful at such an ungodly hour.

  “It’s unnatural,” Griff complained, sipping more coffee and stealing bacon off Nico’s plate. I went ahead and slid my untouched plate to Griff before getting up to fix another. He nodded in gratitude before seeming to remember he was dealing with a time difference. “Why the hell am I even awake right now?”

  “Cause you have a stupid fucking baby,” Nico mumbled. “They fuck up everything related to sleep. Stupid babies.”

  I hid my smile behind my coffee mug as I watched the two friends bitch some more from where I stood at the kitchen island. Griff’s hair was a curly riot sticking up everywhere with no hope of submitting to gravity anytime soon. Likewise, Nico’s Technicolor mane was somehow bobbing and weaving in giant swirls like a soft-serve ice cream cone. A pillowcase crease still marked his cheek, and there was a frowny furrow between his eyebrows that indicated he probably had a hangover headache.

  MJ’s teasing voice cut into my reverie. “You’re staring like a lovesick puppy,” she whispered on a low chuckle. “Gotta say, he’s cute as hell.”

  “Right?” I asked with a sigh. “God. I can’t handle it.”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  “What do you mean? It’s not like I have a choice, MJ. He’s leaving.”

  “Ask him to stay.”

  I turned to look at her with two simultaneous but opposing reactions. On the one hand, god, how I wanted to ask him to stay. On the other, that was an absurd idea. He’d never go for it.

  “You’re insane,” I told my sister. “He has a life, a business, friends back in San Francisco.”

  She reached out and grabbed my chin gently, turning my head to look at Nico before swiveling around to see all the other family members who’d gathered around him at the big table to chat with him and Griff.

  My cousin Felix still held and entertained Pippa, my aunt Carmen leaned over Nico’s shoulder to grab the bottle of pancake syrup, my sister Sassy pointed her finger in Nico’s face to accuse him of stealing her spoon (to which he sheepishly admitted guilt), and Grandpa passed him a platter with more bacon on it.

  “Looks to me like he has those things here too, West,” she said gently. “Maybe he just doesn’t realize it yet.”

  Regardless of how Nico felt about any of it, the scene filled my heart. I had half a mind to call in sick to work, but that wasn’t fair to my patients and staff.

  I reluctantly shoveled breakfast into my mouth before thanking Doc and Grandpa for the impromptu love-in. After running a hand over Pippa’s fat cheeks, I stepped behind Nico’s chair and leaned my face next to his.

  “I gotta go to work,” I said softly.

  He turned with raised eyebrows. “Really? Already?”

  “Yeah, sorry. Ah… I was wondering if maybe I could make you dinner tonight? I know Griff and Rebecca are here, but…” I let out a breath. “I’d like to talk to you about all this stuff. Pippa and everything.”

  “Yeah, I’d like that,” Nico said with a shy smile. “See you later?”

  “Count on it.”

  Chapter 31

  Nico

  After returning to the house and putting Pippa down for a good nap, Griff and I took turns showering and dressing for the day. Rebecca insisted on watching over Pippa while Griff and I went to the bakery.

  Once we were settled in the back, painting some small cakes Rox and Stevie had prepped for us, Griff began catching me up on what was new back home. He told me about Sam teaching a wine-pairings class at his restaurant in Napa and about finally breaking ground on the house they were building on his brother’s vineyard property.

  I thought back to when he and Sam had moved from the city out to the vineyard to open the restaurant. It had almost been two years since then. Two years since I’d lived in the same town as my best friend.

  The time had gone by fast because I’d been working my ass off at the shop. Sam had been busy with the restaurant, and Griff had been busy creating and publishing his graphic novels. They still came into town fairly often to see Griff’s parents, Sam’s sister, and their other friends and family. But it wasn’t the same as it had been when Griff and I had lived in the same town, and since Benji had been born, they’d hardly come to the city at all.

  “Do you like living at the vineyard?” I asked. “I mean, I know you do, but like… was it a hard transition when you left the noise and convenience of the city?”

  Griff thought about it for a moment. “I thought it would be, but I think it was just good timing really. I’d done the single-in-the-city thing and was ready to settle down. I love walking out of our cabin and being able to see the stars, you know? And realizing that our whole lives don’t have to revolve around our jobs. Now that we live at the vineyard, we spend more time outside, taking walks around the lake, hiking, even just eating out there by the lake for lunch breaks.”

  He spun the cake stand around until it was repositioned to his liking before dabbing paint on his brush.

  “I don’t know how to describe it, Nico. It’s almost like… without all the distractions of the city, we’re more relaxed and we can just focus on each other. Focus on Benji. I think if we were living in the city while trying to raise him, it would be a bit too chaotic for us. Plus I love the idea of raising our kids near my brother and his kids. Ella is only a year older than Benji, and if Jude and Derek ever follow through on their plans to build a house in Napa, we’ll have their baby nearby too. Wolfe is just six months older than Ben. Wouldn’t it be awesome raising kids around family like that?”

  I wasn’t sure Griff realized who he was talking to when he mentioned how awesome his big family was. I knew he didn’t do it on purpose, but it still stung.

  “It would be perfect, Griff. I’m really excited for you.”

  I
remained pretty quiet the rest of the time we spent painting side by side in the bakery kitchen, and when we were done, we had each produced several painted minicakes to put out front for sale. Griff’s had his version of cool superheroes on them that reminded me of some of the themes in his graphic novels. If any of our customers knew whose art they were getting on their cake, they’d flip out.

  Mine were different. I’d painted recognizable scenes from around town on the cakes I’d done. One was the old cornerstone bridge over Hazlett’s Creek. One featured the small peony garden in front of the gazebo in the town square. My favorite one was the green Victorian home on Dogwood Street where West lived. I’d blushed deep red when I’d realized what I was painting, but I’d gone ahead and finished it anyway, tucking it discreetly into a bakery box to sneak out of there without anyone else seeing.

  Rox ushered us out after raving over our creations and calling some of our regulars over to take a look at the specialty cakes in the display case. She assured me they’d be sold before closing in a couple of hours, and I’d smiled at her enthusiasm.

  “Nico, before you guys leave, do you mind watching the place while I run over to the bank?”

  “No problem.”

  Griff decided to get a coffee and scone to take outside with him to the gazebo in the center of the square so he could call Sam and catch up. I busied myself cleaning and restocking the sugar and creamer station until the next customer came in. I recognized the woman as Mrs. Foley who had dropped off a casserole to me one of the first days after Adriana’s funeral. She’d also been my fourth grade teacher and I remembered her doing fun science experiments. One had something to do with balloons and whipped cream, but I was hazy on the details.

  “Hi Mrs. Foley,” I said with a smile. “You in the mood for something foxy today?” I’d been thinking about the cupcakes with foxes painted on them and didn’t realize how my question had sounded until Mrs. Foley stood there blinking for a minute. “Oh my… no. I meant… What I meant was, would you like to see some of the painted cupcakes we have special today?”